


Lonely At The Top

by Lewdsmokesoldier



Series: Poll Stories [3]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Genre: Chess, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:55:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25138828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lewdsmokesoldier/pseuds/Lewdsmokesoldier
Summary: After Ganondorf's defeat, Link seems lost, and Zelda has another enormous burden ahead of her. Perhaps, by comforting another broken soul, Zelda might better be able to recover from the tragedy that afflicted her dominion, and the two can find a new path forward together.
Relationships: Link/Midna/Zelda (Legend of Zelda), Link/Zelda (Legend of Zelda)
Series: Poll Stories [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1820980
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	Lonely At The Top

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of my [Poll One-Shot Stories work](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18747037?view_full_work=true), and has been posted separately for ease of navigation and tagging.

War was never pretty, never clean, no matter how controlled individual conflicts purported to be. Ideals of honor and glory generally fell to the wayside in the wake of devastation, chaos, and loss of life. Destroyed communities and shattered families were just a few of the many ugly consequences of invasion. The farms and buildings that needed to be rebuilt needed to be balanced alongside the repairing of damaged institutions and the restoration of confidence, alliances, and exchange systems...and all of that was when things were clear-cut. An attempted annexation across worlds left far deeper scars than most would ever know. Monsters still lingered, many of them natural to Hyrule’s ecology, neither born of Ganondorf’s inherited malice nor created by the misappropriated magic of the Twili, and though the infection of Twilight had faded, traces of its existence endured as wounds in Hyrule’s magical psyche. They would need to be dealt with.

Princess Zelda had studied Hyrule’s history. Ganondorf’s last reign of terror had been averted, but only just, thanks to the machinations of the Hero of Time...and in this instance, the Gerudo warlock hadn’t been preempted. His death did not erase his impact on the world—on _both_ worlds—so easily. And Zelda was certain that he was dead. Not sealed away, as so many other would-be conquerors had, nor imprisoned. She had seen the Triforce fade from his hand, watched his breath whisper from his body even as the massive man had remained standing, supported by his own pre-mortem resolve. Ganondorf was dead.

She felt more than a little sympathy for the man, enough to hope that his spirit might find the peace that had eluded him in life. The details were...fuzzy and not well-preserved, but the records from the Kingdom’s founding suggested that the evil confronted at its inception left a deeper mark that still lingered. If it had manifested itself in what had driven Ganondorf to take up arms against his neighbor, to invite ruin to his own subjects, then all the more reason to hope that he might now be at rest. If his power and drive had only been turned to less destructive ends, the world might have entered a new age of prosperity and cooperation. Hopefully the next king of the Gerudo would avoid whatever misfortune continued to afflict their line. 

The thought of Hyrule’s desert-dwelling neighbors returned Zelda to the present. Whatever sadness she felt for his passing, Ganondorf _had_ inflicted terrible damage to Hyrule’s affairs both foreign and domestic, to those mundane and magical. Or he had at least granted Zant the power to do it himself, taking advantage of a Twili who knew that the punishment of his ancestors still dampened the fortunes of descendants who had no hand in their crimes. Turned to better ends, the ambitions of the two sorcerers might have driven them to improve the lot of their people, but now they would be back where they were before, if not worse off, and Hyrule suffered for their megalomania.

Zelda knew that Midna would do better than Zant, and perhaps something greater could be built in that realm of exiles. It was not her place to engineer such things, however much she hoped. She understood Midna’s reasoning, but she still regretted that she had let it come to pass. She regretted that she had let Midna make such a final decision; she regretted that she had not tried to convince her fellow ruler of the benefits of continued contact; and she regretted that she hadn’t made it clearer how she felt about the Twili woman.

But she couldn’t let her regrets subsume her, or else she’d never escape them. And too many people depended on her keeping her head for her to indulge in self-pity and what-ifs. Her sorrow would have to stay locked in her heart, and might never get the chance to be let out even if she restored things to the way they were before, much less improved them for the future. Zelda had work to do.

Hyrule Castle, free from the grip of a wrongly imposed Twilight, should have comforted her. It was where she had grown up, after all, and reigned for a short, brilliant time. But all that remained following that climactic confrontation was an empty shell of what it once was, the vibrancy of Castle Town around it making the dearth of life of the Castle that much more jarring. She tried to take some comfort in how the art and treasury had escaped somewhat unscathed—save the pottery, which was smashed with almost deliberate consistency—but it was difficult to find anything good in the deafening silence echoing through the dead fortress.

When she walked the gardens, the degradation of the hedges reminded her that the gardeners had been either driven out or slaughtered. The central chambers and hallways were cold and lifeless, still stinking of blood and fear. Bones still lingered in the corners, hollow-eyed skulls staring back at her with toothy, macabre grins. Too many servants, courtiers, soldiers and more had lost their lives in this very structure, caught between her and a power-drunk sorcerer convinced of the righteousness of his own actions. The graveyard would need to commend them appropriately, but there wouldn’t be enough space for all the remains they could locate, and there were many who had left behind no trace who would have to go without identification. Zelda knew the toll outside its walls was worse. The Zoras had their Prince but lost their King and Queen, and melancholy and their initial subjugation had robbed many of life and the rest of hope. Kakariko was a ghost town with barely a fifth of its original population. And those were just the major settlements...

The stairway to her throne room was dilapidated to the point of inaccessibility: as more people returned to the Castle, it might be restored, but she couldn’t think of this as a home. Not with all the memories that lingered, all the horror that this place had stamped onto her memory. If Zelda were a rash sort, she might tear this place down from its foundations to start anew, but that wouldn’t be of any use. She just had to find new architects, new engineers, new soldiers, new bureaucrats, new artisans, and new staff, to name but a few. At least some of the survivors would return of their own volition, now that the pall of terror had passed from the minds of the people, and she could find others willing to join.

Zelda’s mind returned to the good news. The Gorons had emerged almost stronger and more united than before, and if she was correct in her assessment, they’d be happy to help in restoring both Kakariko and the Kingdom at large. Ordon Village’s children were back, and in the grander scheme of things their fortunes would rise as they took the place of the pillaged farms as a new breadbasket for the city. Castle Town had not been sacked. The Gerudo might come back out of hiding and reestablish relations, which would be welcome indeed. New frontiers were opening in Snowpeak. Pilgrims could be reaffirmed of their faith in the Light Spirits and the Goddesses. And some vestige of the Sheikah had survived: perhaps they could yet be saved.

These monumental tasks weighed on her mind, counterbalanced by her aspirations for the future, as she made her way to where she might better focus, away from the tomb that her Castle had become. Her tower was still a part of that disquieting complex, the place where she’d watched and sorrowed as the consequences of her failure fell onto the heads of others. It didn’t seem like the sort of place she’d want to go back to. But it was also here where she had first met Midna, and Link, and found fresh hope amidst the depths of her despair. It was _here_ she had given so much to save her Twilight counterpart and set the Hero on the path of salvation. She had to find something of comfort here, somehow.

And she did. But it wasn’t what she had expected: she’d anticipated finding hope in the lingering memory and magical markers of her “death” in so noble a cause. Or perhaps she’d simply been looking forward to a soft bed, a fireplace, a writing desk, a chair or two, and a view of Castle Town as life and hope returned to it. 

Instead, she found Link.

He was standing where she had been when she’d first encountered him in the form of a wolf, Midna astride his back in her impish countenance. The Master Sword, and the sheathe that came with it, was absent from his person: he’d replaced it with a sword of Ordon make, perhaps the weapon he’d wielded before taking up the Blade of Evil’s Bane. He did not turn to face her, still looking out of her window onto what could be seen of the Kingdom from here, but Zelda saw from the tensing in his shoulders that he had heard her approach. She hadn’t been trying to be subtle, given how she didn’t think anyone else was in the Castle in the first place.

“Greetings, Link.” She spoke flatly, trying to find a balance between cool, queenly distance and the warm reception that such a savior deserved. She settled on lukewarm steel. “I did not expect to find you here.”

He nodded, still looking out through the glass. As she joined him at the windowsill, it seemed...bizarre, to peer through the panes and not see the geometric patterns of Twili magic, or hear the honking that heralded Twilight-corrupted Kargaroks. Even after the veil had been lifted, fog and the swooping of the massive reptilian birds had obstructed her view. Now, the tranquility and stillness, coupled with the clear skies, seemed to paint almost _too_ pretty a picture from this tower.

“I cannot thank you enough. Truly. I owe you a debt that can never be properly repaid, and this Kingdom will, for as long as I can, honor you as befits a Hero chosen by the Goddesses.”

Link tilted his head to look at her, nodding again, his lips set tight as if he was trying not to cry. And then the magnitude of his visit struck her.

Truthfully, she did not know much about Link. Other Heroes and their respective Zeldas had been, from her reading of the histories, much, much closer. Different social statuses had rarely impeded attachment: one Hero in the past, before Ganondorf, had even been a blacksmith’s apprentice, and he’d still befriended the Zelda of his time at a young age. Link had simply never had cause to encounter Zelda, much less grow close, and hadn’t even left his home province until that fateful day of his transformation. Zelda was also aware that Link’s attachments lay elsewhere. In the children and people of Ordon and, most importantly, with Midna. It was the Twilight Princess, not Zelda, who had journeyed across Hyrule and beyond,with Link. Zelda had observed some of the closeness between the two during her time separated from her body, and what she had seen was both reassuring and deeply troubling.

Reassuring because it was no small comfort to see how much the two outcasts meant to each other. Link, ostracized from the comforts of a rural life of pastoralism and farming by his destiny, Midna cursed and exiled by a usurper. They would have made a natural team even without their complementary skillsets, but the Goddesses had brought them together when their worlds had needed them most. This attachment was precisely what troubled Zelda, for if she was so deeply struck with guilt and sorrow over Midna’s departure...how would the man who had spent so many months with Midna, who had risked his life so many times for her, who had bonded and joked and argued with her, feel about such a permanent departure? Midna was, for all they knew, gone forever. 

It was not difficult to see how Link could have come to love her. And how her leaving would have broken his heart. Whatever he felt must have been multiplied tenfold for Midna, for she had been the one to make the decision to destroy the Mirror. But Midna was beyond her ability to help, and Link was not. From what she had seen of him, Link was quiet, but the torment in his soul spoke where words did not. He _needed_ her, the only other person who might understand.

But how to approach this? She was a Princess in name, a Queen in power, and an Empress in authority. When it came to matters such as this, even for a Hero, what was the best way to conduct herself? There were no politicians to impress, no court standards to be upheld, but the question lingered in her mind. Heartbreak was a touchy subject, even for those of lesser responsibilities and expectations than a ruler. Silence was not an option, however.

“I expect gratitude is not why you came here, though.”

Link nodded again, turning to face her fully. He had a grizzled countenance: still fair and halfway effeminate, but with an edge that would have informed her of his history of woe even if she was not already familiar with it.

“It’s Midna, isn’t it?” Zelda reached a hand to Link, the delicately enclosed glove covering her skin nearly up to her shoulder. She’d touched him before, in the plane of the Light Spirits just before confronting Ganondorf with their Light Arrows. The circumstances were less pressing, but the gesture meant the same: comfort and reassurance, an acceptance of responsibility and the knowledge that such duty was both necessary and fulfilling. Link had offered his hand to her then, and she now returned the favor.

He hesitated, then enclosed his fingers in hers, his grip soft in spite of the callouses she could feel through his gloves. Link squeezed lightly, and clenched his jaw. It was quite obvious to her that he was on the verge of tears. Staying silent would have given him the chance to recover his composure...but she couldn’t stop herself from talking.

“I am sorry.” It seemed a disservice to both Midna and Link to reduce her own feelings to something that seemed so inadequate to the gravity of the situation, but Zelda had long struggled with maintaining the veneer of majesty. Every leader was different, but she couldn’t help but believe that for a dominion as vast and varied as her own, a masquerade of calm was necessary. To hold the sorrow and happiness of all Hyrule within herself, she had to forgo attachment to individual tragedies and joys. If that made others think her callous, then she would pay that price: better their aloofness than their suffering. And so she held back the outburst that threatened to pour out of her. 

Her calm imparted some composure to Link and he seemed to reflect her own self-control. The tears she was sure would erupt from him ebbed, and he loosened his grip on her hand. Good. A Hero needed to put more feeling into each and every individual they saved, but it comforted her to know he approached the world as a kindred spirit.

* * *

Over the next few days, Link met with Zelda in her tower between outings into Castle Town and the surrounding field while she directed the reconstruction of edifices, the rehabilitation of soldiers and citizens, the renewal of chains of supply, and other means of injecting new vigor into Hyrule Castle, where she could guide the healing of the rest of the realm. When they met during the lull in activity, she got the sense that Link was trying to keep busy, to sway his mind from lingering on Midna...and perhaps his home.

Once, they’d sat across from each other at a new table in her chamber. Link directed the pieces in black, and her the white: the latter seemed a royal enough color for her tastes. 

He hadn’t responded to any of her questions, at least not verbally. His lack of words weren’t due to concentration on the game—though his gaze  _ was _ fixed on the chessboard—but a result of his natural affinity for silence. Zelda could appreciate a man who knew when to be quiet. She was, quite frankly, too used to witnessing people who believed speaking loudly and quickly meant that their ideas were worth sharing, or that their arguments were meaningful. Unfortunately, many could not be convinced otherwise...and it led to too many women being shut down by men who would not shut up.

She’d watched him move—Knight to D3 from C5. Her King was checked but not trapped, even with the Pilgrim in H4 and the Tower in H1. She’d slid the King upward to the space her Queen had vacated on the piece’s diagonal advance to B5. His turn with the Knight had served the double purpose of escaping her Queen and attacking the King, but the Pilgrim couldn’t touch him now, nor could the Knight. 

Link had played well. Aggressive, but not too bold, and he’d even surprised her a few times. But she’d been playing this game all her life. It wasn’t fair, true, but he had his own talents that she could never equal, so she was perfectly satisfied with their uneven skillsets. He excelled at swordplay, swimming, climbing, wrestling, farming, herding, horseriding and archery, among other abilities. Of these, she only shared his affinity for riding and shooting, but she rose above him in all matters political, magical, social or mathematical...and that was just the beginning. 

And then it had been the time to strike. Would he fall into her trap? She’d made pains to conceal her anticipation, though it was difficult since he refused to become distracted and her eagerness to best him threatened to betray her in a chuckle or tap of her finger.

Link made his move. Tower to H2. He had been trying to lock her into moving her King back and forth. If she’d been less prepared, it would have worked. Unfortunately for Link, Zelda had a plan for that.

“Checkmate.” 

He had blinked, staring down at the board. His eyes, so keen to discern danger at a glance, had struggled to find his undoing. She could almost hear the gears in his head turning as his bafflement refused to release him. Then, it had struck him: epiphany, delivered at the depths of his confusion. 

Yes, he had shackled her King into deadlock and her King was scared off from moving forward by F5’s pawn, but only if she cared about moving him. Sure, she could have taken the Knight diagonally in D3, but why do that when she could win? 

Queen in B5, Pilgrim in A2, Knight in E4 and Tower in G8...while a lonely little Pawn nestled in D6. His King was trapped, his F6 palace now the prison within which he would perish. Or at least be captured.

Link’s jaw had fallen open, and Zelda couldn’t stop the smile from creeping into her features. Being a Princess had its advantages.

“Well played.” She’d conceded with a nod, still beaming as they put the pieces away. Link had returned her grin, chuckling throatily, resting his hand on her palm as she closed the final chessman into the box.

The contact had seemed to linger long after his hand had left, and even after Link had departed her chamber. She’d pressed her fingers to her palm, marveling at how her skin tingled beneath her glove. A simple touch, not out of respect or reverence, but for the simple joy of being near her, was unprecedented. No one save Midna had treated her so warmly since she took the throne. Zelda was, for the first time in years, finally in a position to blush.

* * *

Things had progressed more quickly since then. The chess games continued, and he got a bit better, but she still won every time. He’d started to react to her questions and comments, though she’d never heard him speak a word. 

He’d always confirm his answers, or acknowledgement of her statements, with a nod or a shake of his head, and the conversation would ebb and flow from there.

“Have you heard from the Yeti family you encountered in Snowpeak?” Grunt, shake.

“Do you know if Impaz planning on returning to Castle Town?” Grunt, shake.

“Do you believe Lake Hylia is safe? I do not want to hear any tales of the more...unseemly fish swimming up from the Lakebed Temple.” Grunt, nod.

And so on. He’d only elaborated a bit when she’d asked him something more personal.

“How fares Ordona Province? I understand that their children have returned.” She mentioned to Link once. He’d stiffened his back and stayed quite still, then released the tension in a deep exhale, sinking into the chair and rubbing his forehead. He was unusually mercurial, vacillating between clenching his jaw as if to suggest something painful, and sighing wistfully in memory of something fond. His eyes were equally clouded with his own jumbled emotions.

Zelda understood. Hyrule should have done more to aid the farming community, especially since they had always been united in purpose and dependence. _She_ should have done more. Her own troubles didn’t excuse her of that responsibility. But she knew Link’s mixed feelings lay deeper. He had to be overjoyed that peace and happiness had returned to the idyll he’d grown up in, families reunited and old hurts healed. But after all he had seen, everywhere he had traveled, all the people he had met and one especially who he had lost...he couldn’t stay there. Not anymore. And so he’d set out and, searching for someone who understood him. And that had led him back to her.

It occurred to her, hearing him snarl in frustration at another lost game, that time as a wolf might have helped tune him to nonverbal communication. She could get a read for his mood before he really expressed it, and his eyes, twitching ears, breathing patterns and posture gave her much of the information she needed to deduce his answers. 

Zelda hated to admit it, but his laconic bearing was intriguing. She knew quite a bit about Link, but he carried himself at a distance that so reminded her of the burden she’d lived with, yet he was able to laugh and smile and make full use of his faculties with so few words. That combination of mystery and approachability that made him so appealing to children would certainly attract a _very_ different sort of attention from adults. Especially those would find themselves aroused by his fierce blue eyes, his dark blonde hair, and the sculpted physique that had to be lurking beneath his tunic. He _was_ a fighter, after all, and had wrestled goats for a living before that.

Even the thought of what he might look like disrobed brought a warmth to her cheeks that Zelda couldn’t suppress. By the grace of the Goddesses, he was handsome, and though she was no hopelessly enraptured maiden, he had her under his spell, in a sense. She’d noticed her veneer slipping more and more, little slips in her serenity: a giggle here, a gasp there. Her eyes would linger on his neck and chin when she thought he wasn’t looking, trying to imagine how it would feel to touch his exposed skin. When he lifted her chair to move it for a game, she wondered how it might feel if her picked her up so easily and…

She couldn’t chase these thoughts away, even after the levity ended and it was back to repairing the Castle, soon the rest of the Kingdom. Tearful families of those butchered during the invasion or afterwards came and went, some staying on as new residents of the Castle in various faculties. Chefs and cleaners, gardeners and maids, carpenters and stonemasons and many more all began to return to service or enter it for the first time. Courtiers and noble families slowly became aware of the resurgent monarchy and tried to re-establish old positions or take over ones vacated by the deaths of other gentry. Soldiers trickled back. Some were deserters who’d fled at the first sign of danger, but there were also brave and skillful souls who’d simply been unlucky enough to not be where they were needed—or perhaps that was lucky for them, given the fate of the soldiers who’d fought back against Zant.

For Zelda’s mind to linger on the idea of Link, well, _naked_ during such trying times was highly inappropriate, to say the least. Fortunately, outside of his presence she was able to control herself better, but things were coming to a head. Something had to break: either her self-control, or Link’s apparent obliviousness.

Now, Zelda journeyed back to her chambers, mentally taxed from a trying attempt to wrangle the budding interests already competing within Hyrule Castle. Things were too fresh for rivalries and bickering to spring back up, and she’d nipped those feuds in the bud, but such confrontations took energy. She needed to rest. She was too tired to keep up her masquerade, which meant it was time to retire for the day.

Link was waiting for her, as she expected by now. His gaze wasn’t trained on the window: instead, it was fixed on the stairway, waiting for her. As she closed the doors, the back of her neck tingled, and she got the distinct sense that he was still looking at her. 

“Hello, Link.” She didn’t have much energy to talk today, so when he held his hand up for her to be quiet, she was inwardly grateful. But then he waited, and he watched, and Zelda met his eyes. 

He’d been crying, the tracks visible on his cheeks and chin, dripping down onto his tunic. She hadn’t heard him as she’d approached, but he’d obviously been shedding tears uncontrollably, and had wanted to do so here, where no one could see him. No one except her.

Zelda couldn’t keep the illusion up anymore. Not here, not when Link was the only one who could judge her, and she knew he wouldn’t. Not when she understood him so much. Her arms wrapped around his head, cradling him as he sobbed into her dress, heedless of the stains he’d leave. She didn’t care, either.

“I know.” She whispered into his hair, stroking his ears as the tears arose in her unbidden. Before she could stop it, she was joining him, crying for the first time in years. Even as a captive in her own Castle, she’d never sobbed, especially once Midna showed up. Ironic, given that the barrier to her expressing her sorrow back then was prompting it now.

She missed the sly, scheming little imp, full of plans and venom and seething with a desire to strike back when all thought her powerless. Though she’d only known her in her true form for a short time, she missed _that_ woman, too, tall and graceful, majesty impossible to deny, though she kept the snark that was now tempered with restraint and compassion. Zelda saw so much of herself in the Twilight Princess, and yet so much difference too. Midna had always broadcasted her thoughts and inclinations, though not her secrets, where Zelda would have shut them all away. But both were devoted to their people and, ultimately, to each other.

Zelda had imparted some of her soul to Midna, and there was little that could make their impact on each other clearer than that. They’d changed their counterpart for the better. Zelda was opening her shell, and Midna had worn down her rough edges, which made separation all the more difficult.

“I loved her, too.” Zelda murmured, tilting Link’s face up to hers, their noses nearly touching. He didn’t seem surprised, eyes still awash with tears. “I _still_ do. It hurts, deeper than any pain I’ve known.” 

His mouth was half-open now, lips pursed slightly, one of his hands on her shoulder. Zelda couldn’t stop herself. If he was trying to say anything, he didn’t get the chance when her lips came down to meet his, kissing him between sobs and cracks in her voice. Her hands tangled in his hair, knocking his hat off his head, their tears mingling as their cheeks pressed ever closer.

She didn’t have to say what she wanted. He understood, in his own way. Midna was gone, and with her went all the connection and love and life they’d found with that endearing Twili. But they still had each other, and finding solace in grief was better than aching alone.

Link’s hands moved from her shoulder to her pauldrons and necklace, unfastening it all and letting it slide to the floor, then undoing the cord that held up the tabard depicting her heraldry as he pushed her to the bed. Zelda struggled to move her arms over her head without breaking away from his mouth, but she succeeded, shivering as Link lifted her dress up slowly with his hand on the shoulder straps. Her riding boots, worn more out of habit than any expectation of equestrian activity, came into view first, followed by the snowy-white lacing of her leggings as they hugged her thighs, and then her equally pristine undergarments were exposed. Zelda gasped as their lips parted, her dress came up over her head, and she was left nearly naked in front of a man for the first time in her life. Link wiped his tears away with the back of his gauntlet, eyes lighting up and chasing away the fog that had clouded them as he looked her over.

She’d stood before Zant, in all his menace, and had not faltered. But now, sitting on the edge of the bed she’d passed her imprisoned nights on, wearing scant more than her brassiere, pantyhose and intimates, she was afraid. Afraid that she’d rushed into this, afraid that he’d disappoint her, afraid that she’d give him cause to flee. She was a woman of dignity and grace and majesty, but it was difficult to keep all that in mind when Link was scrutinizing her with such obvious interest. She hadn’t seen him assume his lupine form in some time—it was unlikely she would ever again given that Midna, the cause of all this, was the one who held that power—but Zelda was certain that Link’s gaze held a hint of predatory hunger. A glimpse into the mentality he’d adopted as a wolf, and the boldness that characterized him still. He _wanted_ her.

Trailing gentle kisses down her chin and between her breasts, Link began unbuckling his gauntlets, the hair hanging above his brow tickling Zelda as he dragged his lips across her. Lower and lower went his mouth until his chin was grazing the fabric covering her slit, his bare hands resting on the cord holding the triangle of cloth together. He paused for a moment, and then another, and the anticipation left Zelda biting her lip and resisting the urge to squirm and press her covered crotch against his face. But no matter what he subjected her to, she would not beg. And she knew he wouldn’t make her if she wasn’t interested in playing along.

Luckily, he didn’t leave her waiting long. With a nod in her direction, he tightened his grip on her undergarments and began to pull, peeling them and her pantyhose down her legs and revealing the supple skin of her thighs. Sharper, bolder white fell away, replaced by a softer pale hue that seemed to glow in the candlelight of her tower. Something else was shimmering, too: her slit, exposed and topped with a smooth patch that mirrored the color of her hair, glistening with her anticipation. Zelda had never done anything like this before, not even on her own, and now that things had escalated, she was quickly entering uncharted territory. It was a good thing Link knew what to do.

He started with slow, exploratory licks, extending his tongue to let it slide from the top of her slit down and back again, circling her clit. Zelda muffled a gasp by burying her face in her elbow, heedless of the risk of tearing her gloves as he began to exert the warm, wet power of his tongue over her. Link was attentive and diligent, careful to not overwhelm her by starting too fast or escalating before he got the sense she was ready. Zelda had no idea, but she was communicating her pleasure wonderfully; her thighs twitched next to his ears as he held up her legs; her jaw clenched and her hands began to curl into fists, one digging into the bedsheet while the other pressed against the outside of her thigh. She wasn’t saying anything, but she didn’t have to: she’d never gotten the chance to feel the throb and buzz of such pleasure from stimulation of her nethers, not even for masturbation, and if _this_ was just the beginning, she knew she’d never neglect it again. How had she gone so long without experiencing this in the slightest, only to find such joy now? Another thing to thank Midna for..

Link was confident enough in her rhythm to apply his mouth now, adding some suction on the hood of her muff when he prodded and encircled it with his tongue. The pressure forced his cheeks inward, but the vacuum had the desired effect, thrumming his lips against her vaginal lips so rapidly that Zelda had no choice but to move the hand against her thigh into his hair, grabbing and holding as she tried to cope with the new ministrations atop the old, adding to the heat radiating from her crotch and the positive feedback that came with it. She didn’t know _what_ it was, but the warmth and pulsing pleasure was intensifying, coming together faster and harder and _yes,_ whatever was happening was so close, about to crest, and…

Zelda enjoyed the first orgasm of her life at the dutiful lips and tongue of Link, a wild crescendo of spasming thighs, quivering nethers and gasping, frantic moans and whines that she fruitlessly tried to suppress by burying her mouth in her shoulder. It was no use, but Link didn’t seem to mind neither the noise nor the taste of her squirting onto his tongue and face. Far from it, for he took the time and effort to attentively slurp up the remnants of her orgasm from her shining, dripping slit, licking his chin to make sure he got everything he could before finally wiping his cheeks with the back of his hand. Zelda was still lightheaded, trying to return to her senses. Devoting herself to duty and a rigid governing style hadn’t prepared her for such profoundly uncontrollable release . Her legs still ached from how tensely she’d been holding them, but the shockwaves were receding. 

He planted a kiss on the inside of her thigh and glanced at her, asking permission to continue, a hand on the hem of his tunic. Zelda gave him a nod, any desire to maintain more than a token wall of iciness gone in her pursuit of _more_. If they were going to fall into this passion born of desperate, shared despondence and desire, then they would go all the way. No more half-measures, and certainly no more second-guessing, not when hesitation had already cost them so much. Link seemed grateful for her decisiveness, if the urgency with which he pulled up his chainmail and discarded his boots was any indication, leaving him in only his beige-toned shirt and trousers, and those quickly followed suit in his excitement. He started with his shirt, pulling it up and off from the bottom so quickly that Zelda wondered if it would tear, and she couldn’t suppress a gasp at what she saw beneath as he pulled off his pants, too.

It wasn’t just that he was _strikingly_ attractive beneath his shirt, his muscles well-toned yet slim, the body of a farmer-turned-adventurer. It wasn’t just that he was... _remarkably_ well-endowed, though she had no comparison to measure his against. It wasn’t just that, now that she could see him, _all_ of him, she had a true and honest understanding of how every element of his person from his head to his feet made him the peerless picture of a Chosen Hero.

No, what struck her most was how many scars and marks littered Link’s otherwise flawless form. There, on the right side of his chest was a depression, a circular indentation in the skin, deep enough that a rib or three had certainly broken—it appeared to be the consequence of a large spherical object colliding with him, perhaps a ball-style flail. Across his stomach was an ugly line of pockmarks of similar but inexact sizes, the sign of being bitten right across the middle by a creature with long, thin teeth. A chaotic portrait of injury and pain was painted across his body in other burn scars, puncture and incision wounds, venom discolorations, and more that she didn’t even recognize. She knew the path of a Hero was a dangerous one, and had even had some awareness of what specifically befell him when her soul was being carried by Midna, but she’d never imagined that he’d endured _this_ much suffering.

Link caught her staring, but she didn’t avert her eyes. He didn’t seem bothered by them, not anymore, and Zelda had to admit that she wasn’t as disgusted by them as she initially thought. They added character, and told stories that she’d be happy to hear from the man himself...but had they been worth the pain? However much she had suffered from the indignity and humiliation of it all, even her physical suffering had never reached that of many of her subjects. She still lived, for one, whole in body in spite of temporarily losing it. Link didn’t have that luxury.

Zelda didn’t speak, but she didn’t need to. Link was quite used to nonverbal communication. He understood that her discomfort came not from his physical appearance, but from the knowledge that he’d suffered so severely for the sake of Hyrule and the realm of the Twili. He reached out a hand and she took it, letting him guide her to press her gloved fingers against his chest, above his heart. The pulse pumped beneath the skin vigorously, and she knew what he was trying to say.

_It is my burden to bear. You have yours. But we can share the pain and the relief, even if we can’t both partake of the tribulations that led to the marks that we still hold. And there is one trial that we endured in equal part._

Or perhaps that was just what she _hoped_ he thought. But Zelda knew she wasn’t very far off, and whatever the specific wording, he was right. They had their own parts to play, and needed to find comfort in any way they could. So she pulled herself forward, rising to kiss him, and let him guide her as he wished. She trusted Link to help them both, as he’d aided to many others.

Contrary to her expectations, he didn’t lay her back on the bed, instead swapping so that his back was on the bedsheets, pillows fluffed behind his head. His erection jutted up pointedly, intimidating in girth and length and leaking a drop of clear fluid. She almost hesitated— _that_ was going in her?—but instead she smiled. Riding was something she was _very_ experienced with. Perhaps this would be easier than she had expected.

She clambered on top of him, taking care not to knee him in the testicles as she positioned her legs on either side of his hips, arms still encased in sweat-drenched white gloves. The braids of her hair hung on either side of her breasts, and she took the chance to finally undo her brassiere, tossing aside the slinky material and granting Link, at last, the opportunity to look upon her fully. Zelda had seen many chests in her life, albeit never one that was unclothed, and she was under the impression that she was well-proportioned for her build. Link seemed to agree, his length jumping and slapping against her crotch as she prepared herself.

It was still an intimidating prospect, the idea of taking that cock inside of her. Even using the word sounded vulgar, crude, unbecoming even in thought of a royal, but perhaps this wasn’t the place to hang on ceremony and etiquette. Such standards had their place, but if she was going to lose her virginity she couldn’t go about it in the manner of a Princess attending a gala, so she had better get herself used to using that kind of language. Cock, dick, cunt and pussy...if she was going to be ready for everything Link had to give her, then she had to accept some relaxing of uptight traditions of language.

She shifted up and forward, holding her dripping snatch above his cockhead, primed to be entered. The void between Zelda’s legs seemed all the more present, all the more _real_ for the knowledge that soon it would be filed with the thickest dick she’d likely ever take. Link looked back up at her again, a reassuring smile on his face as he interlocked his fingers in hers and nodded. He was ready, even if she was the one who hadn’t done anything like this before, but she couldn’t delay any longer. Keeping their hands enclosed, Zelda took one deep breath, then two, and then started to spread her legs, feeling the tip of his length begin to part her folds.

A hiss escaped from between her teeth, but Zelda kept going, kept lowering herself onto Link, feeding more and more of his thick cock into her. It was...uncomfortable, to be stretched so thoroughly after never having so much as touched herself before today, but she didn’t stop until a wave of dizziness overtook her. Looking down, she gaped—she’d been sinking onto Link’s dick for what felt like an eternity, and she wasn’t even halfway down! He wasn’t _that_ ridiculously sized...was he? She had no idea how “big” they could get, so for all she knew he was just about the largest a Hylian could be. Perhaps it was all in her head, and she wasn’t descending around his cock nearly as fast as she thought she had. But she couldn’t risk falling down onto him all at once, not when he was still testing the limits of her inner elasticity. It wasn’t painful, but the fullness was difficult to adjust to. 

Link cooed softly, encouraging her by squeezing her hands in his. The predator was still there, the blue-eyed beast that so dearly longed for this, but it was content to wait while she took her time. Zelda wouldn’t let him down, wouldn’t let _herself_ down, and neither of them could let the memory of Midna down. They would make this work. Zelda kept taking more of Link’s cock until, at last, her pelvis was flush against his, her clitoris rubbing his pubic hair, and they both let out a moan. Hers, one of relief as she finally conquered this first mountain and lost her virginity, his one of bliss as he enjoyed the sensation of his cock being buried up to the hilt in Princess Zelda’s tight, warm snatch. 

Gently at first, Zelda began to lift herself off of Link, coming back down when he was half-inside of her and repeating it. It still wasn’t painful, but she was starting to get something out of this, too. Her clit pressed against Link’s pelvis whenever he bottomed out in her, sending a tiny jolt of pleasure up from her crotch every time. It was enough motivation for her to overcome the second hurdle and start moving faster. With the practiced ease of an expert horserider and the strong hips and legs to match, Zelda started to ride Link into the bed, alternating between watching her own tits bounce from her motions and meeting his eyes. Link looked happy to be ridden, to enjoy Zelda’s ministrations after treating her so well with his own, and let her know with gentle grunts of affirmation. 

Zelda knew she had to be wrapping around his dick quite powerfully, bearing down so hard that it was probably almost painful for him to continue, but he evidently didn’t mind. For her part, Link was so big that speeding up blurred the line even more between discomfort and positive stimulation, but the newfound heights of pleasure were worth it. His size meant that he left the most delightful friction and pressure when his cock dragged against her inner walls, stretching her out and radiating warmth into her from his intruding shaft. And every bump of her clit against his skin was a little stronger, giving her a little more drive to move forward, a little more tension in her legs.

The same sensation from before began to build, a coil in her stomach that tensed and tightened with each movement up and down on that wonderfully thick cock. Zelda gripped his hands even more powerfully, trying to keep up the pace in spite of the protests of her overworked thighs, chasing that joy of being filled and half-emptied over and over and all the satisfaction that came with it. Link ground his teeth together in his focus, clearly trying to hold himself back, but there wasn’t much he could do against such furiously fast-paced undulations on his shaft. He growled, moving with her to pump his cock upwards when she came down, their bodies meeting with a clapping sound, the hood of her slit striking his skin with even greater force. Neither of them could keep eye contact anymore—Zelda was too focused on jumping on his dick, Link on holding off his orgasm from the furious motions around his shaft—but they didn’t need to meet each other’s gaze to know what was coming. 

Link broke first, his interlocked fingers trying to make a fist around her hand as it became too much for him. The wet heat of Zelda’s pussy, gripping and sucking all around him; the sight of her bouncing tits, moving up and down with her motions atop him; the knowledge that it was the Princess of Hyrule taking his cock and loving it the whole time: it appeared it was all too much for him. He erupted, balls tensing as he fired his load up into her cunt, hosing down the inside of her pussy with all the thick, virile cream she could have ever asked for. The sudden surge of heat and fullness rushing into her left Zelda reeling, the weight of Link’s cock stretching her out now joined by the flood of cum. The double-dose of dicking and spunk was more than Zelda could take, and she left herself drop on him one last time, pussy quivering and clamping around him even as he kept cumming. Her mind swam and her eyes watered as the sensations assailed her, but more than anything else, Zelda was _happy_. Happy that she was here with Link happy that this had all turned out so gloriously well, happy that in their own way they’d paid tribute to the one who’d brought them together.

Link finally stopped flooding her with cum, but his cock didn’t soften even as Zelda sighed and loosened her grip on him, both with her hands and her cunt, still flooded with his load. Sweat beaded their bodies and her limbs cried out for rest, but a single glance at each confirmed what they knew. 

They _definitely_ weren’t done yet.

* * *

Their night had only begun, and they had so much more that they could do together. Now, they enjoyed a banquet of pleasure as they explored each other’s bodies, trying to find their partner’s sensitivities and hidden joys.

Zelda had taken Link’s cock in hand, jerking him until he’d let loose his cum all over her breasts while she mewled encouragement. She’d nuzzled into his balls while he stroked himself until he coated her hair in his seed, and let him rub his length between her buttocks while she pressed her face and tits against the wall until he came all over her lower back, too.

By far her favorite was when he bent her over on the bed on her hands and knees, held onto her hips, and eased himself into her rear. It had been uncomfortable, feeling him spread her ass wide on his cock, but she quickly grew to love the sensation of his dick gliding in and out of her butt, his balls pressing up against her cunt lips whenever he buried himself in fully. Being taken like this, with her ass in the air and her face pressed against the pillow, was far from dignified. She didn’t get to see his face, while he enjoyed the sight of her bare back and her buttocks pressing against his pelvis. But, somehow, the position was all the more enjoyable for the power it let him hold over her as he draped himself across her back, then leaned away to enjoy her back hole with more force. Being taken this way felt...feral, almost as if he’d let his wolfish instincts run free. His growling and grunting as he slid his cock in and out of her ass certainly helped her envision that, to her sincere delight. She _loved_ howaggressive he was getting with her and spurred him on with all the submissive whines and squeals she could muster.

It wasn’t long before he’d let loose the same way he’d spilled his seed in her pussy, draining his balls into her ass and leaving Zelda's butt awash with the warmth and fullness of his erupting orgasm. It was more than enough to trigger another one of her own quivering releases between her legs. As Link pulled out, his cock finally began to soften, and he crawled up to wrap his arms around her as she caught her breath, ass oozing his cum while she stayed bent over.

She was a mess, awash with sweat and cum, the latter drying in her hair and on her skin. It still hadn’t fully sunk in just how thoroughly she’d enjoyed this: being here, with Link, after everything they’d endured, had promised so much, and he’d exceeded all her hopes. As he wrapped her in his arms, pulling her to her side so he was spooning her, heedless of the cum he’d sprayed across her body and blasted inside her, Zelda was left to wonder what would happen next...and to remember thank who’d made it possible.

Midna had saved them both, and then she’d broken both of their hearts for what they could only hope was for the better. And now, in her memory, Link and Zelda could find a new happiness. 

If Midna was watching them, through whatever veils existed between their worlds, Zelda imagined that she’d be smiling.


End file.
